Watch Nate Parker Get Annoyed With Robin Roberts for Asking About Rape Allegations

Watch Nate Parker Get Annoyed With Robin Roberts for Asking About Rape Allegations

The 'GMA' anchor said, "This can't be dismissed."

Published October 3rd

Nate Parker is currently on the promo trail for his new film The Birth of a Nation, which — as expected — has been overshadowed by the resurfacing of his 2001 college rape trial.

This morning, the actor sat down with Robin Roberts of Good Morning America and became visibly frustrated when asked about the incident and the lack of remorse he expressed when talking about it on 60 Minutes on Sunday night.

"I was falsely accused," he said during the segment. "I was proven innocent and I'm not going to apologize for that."

"You have a daughter in college," Roberts said during the interview. "What do you tell her?"

"She knows how I feel about her and I've addressed it so many times," he said. "I think the important thing, you know, is this isn't about me. The story of Nat Turner as an American, as American people, the story about a man who was erased from history, at some point. I think that's where our focus should be."

The conversation about the rape trial began to spread back in August when he directly addressed what happened with Variety before it was revealed that his accuser had committed suicide in 2012. Both Parker and his college roommate Jean Celestin — who is a co-writer on The Birth of a Nation — were charged in 1999, during their time at Penn State University, with raping an 18-year-old female classmate in the privacy of their apartment. Though the actor was acquitted in the trial, Celestin was convicted of sexual assault, but the charge was overturned four years later by a Superior Court judge.

To this day, both Parker and Celestin say that the sex was completely consensual by all parties involved.